


The Friendly Ghost

by corvidkohai



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Ghost Zack Fair, Haunting, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-12
Updated: 2019-10-12
Packaged: 2020-12-12 05:48:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20999909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/corvidkohai/pseuds/corvidkohai
Summary: Zack returns as a ghost to haunt Seventh Heaven after Advent Children. The only problem is, Cloud can’t see him.





	The Friendly Ghost

No one was entirely sure what to make of it, at first. 

The children weren’t alarmed; they were just young enough not to be immediately terrified about finding a stranger in their home. 

Denzel had found him first. He was walking the halls above Seventh Heaven, where he lived with Tifa, Cloud, and Marlene (when she wasn’t with her father). He’d gotten up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and found a silhouette outside Cloud’s door when he glanced over after leaving the restroom. And it was man-shaped, so it wouldn’t normally be that odd, except it was far too tall to be Cloud himself. The figure was leaning against the wall across from Cloud’s door, apparently just watching it. 

“Hello?” Denzel called, only a little bit of nerves in his voice. 

The figure looked toward him before pushing away from the wall and Gaia, he was taller like that. He approached relatively slowly, and while that made Denzel nervous, it would have been worse if he rushed at him. When the figure got to him, he crouched down, putting them almost at eye level, with how tall he was. But he could see the man now—dark hair that spiked back in a way not unlike Cloud’s, violet eyes that glowed in a way very  _ much _ like Cloud’s, an earring that winked in the low light that  _ also _ matched Cloud, a scar on his face that Denzel had seen echoed across every AVALANCHE member, in one spot or another. It was all the similarities that had Denzel relaxing, even before the man gave him a bright smile. 

“Heya, what’re you doing up? It’s late, y’know,” the man said, some sort of simple joy, some warmth in his tone that set Denzel further at ease. 

“Bathroom. What’re you doing here? The bar’s closed, and customers aren’t allowed upstairs.”

“I’m not exactly a customer. I’m a friend. Just swung by for a visit, but everyone’s asleep right now. Except you, and you oughta be.”

“Whose friend are you? I’ve never seen you before, and I thought all Cloud and Tifa’s friends visited.”

“I’m an old, old friend, and I don’t live here. I can’t visit very often.”

“Oh. Do you want me to wake someone up for you? If you came far, you should see who you came for.”

A smile lit the man’s face, but it was small and strangely sad. 

“That’s okay, maybe some other time. Let’s get you back to bed, though, huh?”

The smile was brighter this time, as the man stood. He didn’t reach out to take his hand or steer him by the shoulder the way most adults would, and that was odd, but not the oddest thing about this all. The stranger led him back to his own door, though Denzel didn’t know how he knew which one that was.

When they got there, the man said, “Hey, there’s no way I could talk you into not telling Cloud and Tifa you saw me, is there?”

Denzel looked up at him, confused. 

“But shouldn’t they know they missed you?”

“I don’t want ‘em feeling bad that I couldn’t catch them.”

“Oh. Okay, sure.”

“... You’re still going to tell them, aren’t you?”

“Yeah.”

The man sighed and ruffled his hair, a wry smile on his lips. 

“Guess that’s fair—stranger walking around in your place and all that. Probably responsible of you. Maybe try to just tell Tifa? Cloud’ll be  _ really  _ bummed he missed me.”

Denzel considered this for a moment. He was going to tell Cloud first; the man had been outside  _ his _ door, after all. But Cloud seemed happier these days, and he didn’t want to ruin that. Besides, if it was really important, Tifa would tell Cloud herself. 

“Okay.”

The grin he got was blinding. The man opened his door for him and nodded into the room. 

“Go on, get some rest. And thanks.”

Denzel mumbled some sort of acknowledgement, he knew, but he was more focused on his bed than anything now. The door shut behind him once he was in the room, and he got back into bed, falling asleep almost as soon as he hit the pillow. 

The next day, he almost forgot to say something. Then he thought it was a dream, and maybe he shouldn’t. But it was better safe than sorry, so he told Tifa anyway. She looked more alarmed than he was expecting. Right up until he described the man—then, she just looked confused. She promised Denzel that it was okay, and that man was allowed to visit, and everything would be fine. Aeris had probably sent him; while Denzel had never actually met her, she still felt like his big sister. He wondered how she could have sent that man, but if Tifa said it was alright, he would trust her. She nodded, and then turned serious. 

“Try not to tell Cloud about this, okay?”

“That’s what that man said. Why can’t Cloud know?”

“Because he’ll be very, very upset that he didn’t get to see him. They knew each other a long time ago, and Cloud misses him a lot. If his friend can figure out a way to get to see Cloud, then that’s great, but that’s out of our hands.”

“Wouldn’t it help if Cloud knew to expect him, though?”

“We don’t know when he’ll be able to visit next. He’d be sitting around all day waiting, and miserable because he missed his first chance. Let’s leave it up to them, alright?”

Denzel wasn’t convinced, but he nodded anyway. 

Denzel didn’t see the man again for a long, long time. Marlene saw him next, when she went downstairs for a glass of water one night. When she came back upstairs, a man was sitting on the floor in front of Cloud’s door. She walked over until she could see him better in the dark, and when he finally looked up at her, he didn’t seem surprised to find her there. 

“You’re the man from the photograph,” Marlene said, looking him over again, but she was sure. 

“What photograph?”

“The one Cloud keeps face-down in his nightstand drawer. It’s framed nice, but I’ve only ever seen him look at it once. He looked sad when he did.”

A small smile curved on the man’s face; Marlene found it odd, because he seemed sad in spite of it. 

“Yeah, that sounds about right,” he said, ruffling his hair. 

“Why are you sitting out in the hallway?”

“I’m trying to decide if it’s a bad idea to go in or not.”

“Because you’ll wake Cloud up? Tifa won’t let us; I saw her do it once, and he almost hit her. He seemed more scared than angry, though. You could probably just throw something at him, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

The man smiled wider, but somehow he looked sadder. 

“Ah, Spike,” he mumbled. “I probably shouldn’t be surprised.”

“Why not?”

He looked up and blinked, apparently not having expected her to be able to hear him. Then he smiled again, and it still looked sad, and was this man ever happy? He had seemed it, in that photo. 

“Cloud’s been through a lot. You know that, right?”

Marlene nodded gravely; it was something they never discussed in the house. But it had been explained to her a long time ago, so she would understand why he was off sometimes. 

“Going through the kind of stuff he has,” the man continued, “can make you jumpy. Especially when you’re not all the way awake. I’m sure he wasn’t trying to hurt Tifa; I just don’t think he knew it was her, at first.”

“Who did he think it was?”

“Could have been a lot of people, but maybe don’t ask him. I don’t think he’d like to talk about it.”

She nodded again and said, “If you’re not afraid of waking him up, why won’t you go see him?”

The man gave her a considering look, and slowly said, “I’m only allowed to come here if I follow some rules. One of them is that he isn’t allowed to see me. So I shouldn’t risk going in, since I might not be able to come back, if he wakes up. But I do wanna see him.”

Marlene took this in stride. 

“Crack the door open. Then you can peek in, and even if he wakes up, he won’t be able to recognize you since he can’t see most of you.”

The man blinked at her, and then grinned, and it was finally, finally happy. It got her to smile back. 

“Kid, you’re a genius.”

Her smile turned into a scowl. 

“Don’t call me ‘kid.’”

This made the man laugh as he stood up. 

“Gaia, you’ve been around Cloud too long; you sound just like him.”

Marlene scoffed, saying, “No one would call him ‘kid.’”

The man gave her a wide grin and said, “I used to, but only sometimes, because he got this cute little pout that he wouldn’t admit  _ was _ a pout. Does he still do that?”

Marlene laughed and said, “Only when he’s tired.”

“Cute,” Zack said with a smile, but it faded slowly. “Listen, don’t tell him I was here, okay? It’ll make him upset.”

“Because he can’t see you?”

“That’s right.”

“Okay.”

Zack led her back to her bedroom and opened the door for her. 

As she went inside, he said, “G’night, kid.”

She huffed and looked back at him. She did something her daddy always told her not to. She learned it from Cid, who had told her to forget she saw it as soon as he’d realized she’d been watching. Yuffie encouraged her to use it, once she knew. But Tifa didn’t like it when she did it either. Cloud looked amused when she did, but told her to stop anyway. 

She flipped Zack off. 

It shocked a bright laugh out of him. With a huge smile, he cheerfully mirrored the gesture, and that was something no one had done before. Marlene was still blinking in surprise when he closed the door behind him, still chuckling. 

She told Tifa she saw the man in the photograph, and Tifa had made her promise not to tell Cloud, much like the man had. That hadn’t surprised her. She wasn’t surprised until Tifa was. 

“What do you mean, rules?”

“He said there were rules he had to follow, or he wouldn’t be allowed to visit anymore. One of them was that Cloud couldn’t see him. Who would stop him from coming back for that?”

Tifa gave a thoughtful frown. 

“Aeris probably sent him, but I don’t think she made that rule. I think that’s probably just how things work.”

“Huh?”

Then Tifa smiled and said, “Nevermind. He has to follow the rules, right? Doesn’t matter who made them.”

Marlene looked wildly unsatisfied with this answer, but said, “I guess.”

Then Tifa steered the conversation in a different direction, and Marlene more or less forgot about it. 

She and Denzel would see the man from time to time in the hall, watching through a crack in Cloud’s door. When Cloud had asked them all at breakfast one morning if someone had been cracking open his door, Tifa had told him he probably wasn’t shutting it all the way, and that had been the end of it. 

Until Tifa started to hear footsteps coming from Cloud’s room when she knew he was asleep. 

She thought maybe she’d been mishearing, but then Cloud asked if anyone had been moving his things around over dinner. 

“I’m not mad if anyone did,” he insisted, fixing them all with a look. “But not everything in my room is safe—like my sword. I don’t want anyone hurt.”

When they all said they hadn’t, Cloud dropped it. 

Until he cornered Tifa early one morning. 

“Alright, Teef, it’s getting old.”

“What is?”

“Moving stuff around in my room. Ha ha, very funny. You had your laugh. But putting the picture from Nibelheim on my nightstand was a bit much, don’t you think?”

Tifa paused, unsure if she should tell him the truth.  _ She  _ hadn’t seen Zack, but both the children had, and they’d come to her individually. There was a chance it wasn’t real, but what if it was?

She must have stalled too long, because Cloud said, “Now I know you know something. Out with it.”

Tifa paused again and then slowly said, “Promise not to think I’m crazy?”

“I don’t think I have a lot of room to talk, in that department. What is it?”

“I think we’re being haunted.”

“... Like ghosts?”

“Yeah.”

Cloud shivered; he’d always been superstitious, and Tifa knew that. She probably should have expected for him to take it in stride. 

Which he very much did, because he said, “I keep feeling like someone’s watching me while I’m sleeping. And that explains my cracked door. Why didn’t you say something?”

“Because most people don’t believe that easily that there are ghosts around.”

Cloud shrugged and said, “Well, as long as it’s not causing trouble. I wish it would quit moving my things, though. Y’know I found First Tsurugi entirely broken down on the floor the other morning, perfectly polished?”

Tifa blinked but, yeah, that sounded like something a SOLDIER like Zack would take interest in. 

“I dunno what to tell you, Cloud.”

He sighed and ruffled his hair, saying, “Yeah, I mean, it’s a ghost. I don’t really expect you to have answers.”

Except she did. And she wasn’t giving them up. 

Still, she didn’t expect to see him. 

She was up late checking her books after she found an error in her numbers that set all the others off. It meant she spent hours and hours redoing her math until things came out even. It was early morning when she finally made her way upstairs to see that Cloud’s door was ajar. When she went to close it, she couldn’t help but look in, and there was no way she could have missed what was clearly Zack Fair sitting on the edge of the bed, watching Cloud sleep. There was a long moment before he looked up at her and smiled fondly. He stood from the bed and walked out into the hall, shutting the door carefully behind him. 

“It really is you, huh?” Tifa said, looking him up and down. It was like he had stepped out of her memories, right down to the uniform. 

He gave her a bright smile and held his hands out. 

“Here in the not-flesh.”

“So you  _ are _ a ghost, then. The kids didn’t seem to know you’re dead.”

“Didn’t want to spook ‘em. I think seeing a stranger in their home did enough of that already.”

She sighed, ruffling her hair in a gesture she had picked up from Cloud. 

“Here I was kinda hoping for a miracle.”

“Me being here this way is the closest we’re gonna get, I’m afraid.”

She paused and looked up at him to see the wry twist of his lips. He clearly was about as happy about that as she was. 

“Marlene said you can’t let Cloud see you.”

“It was mostly true. Cloud won’t be able to see me.”

“What? Why?”

“It’s the rules. Whoever you’re closest to that’s alive won’t be able to see you. Can’t very much go around arguing with Gaia to change the rules, as much as I’d like to.”

Tifa felt her heart sink. Cloud was going to be devastated.

“That’s why you don’t want him to know.”

“Right. You know how he’ll take it.”

She winced. Yeah, she knew. 

“Maybe stop moving his things around? He’s definitely noticed. Keep putting that photo up and he might guess anyway.”

Zack sighed and said, “I know, I know it was stupid. Is it bad, the selfish part of me wants him to know?”

At this, Tifa softened. 

“You miss him as much as he misses you, don’t you?”

Zack smiled sadly at her. 

“How much did he ever tell you? About us.”

“He came clean about the lot of it. The lab, the running, the cliff. You two, together. He wanted to explain why we couldn’t be together. I don’t think he’ll ever be over you, you know.”

Zack laughed softly, ruffling his hair. Maybe Cloud had picked that gesture up from him, originally. 

“He’s not really the type to move on. He finds something he cares about, he holds it as tight as he can with both hands. Which is great, except when it slips through his fingers anyway, and he keeps reaching for it.”

Tifa sighed; it wasn’t so long ago, she thought she might be the one he clung to like that. Though she supposed he did, just in a different way. 

“It doesn’t sound like you’re doing a much better job with moving on.”

At this, Zack laughed. 

“One of the things we’ve always had in common is being tenacious little bastards,” he said, not seeming that sad about it, and certainly not sorry. “I’m gonna keep reaching for him until he’s able to reach back. Not that I want to hurry that along—if he doesn’t get a long life with a lot more happiness than he’s had so far, I’m gonna find someone to take it up with.”

“Are you  _ sure _ you don’t want him to know it’s you?”

“No? I  _ want _ him to know, but hey, I’m trying to be responsible for once,” he said, before he softened, his voice dipping a little lower. “I’ve hurt him bad enough already.”

“I think he might disagree with that.”

“Because he likes to forget that even good things can hurt. And he always did forgive me too easily.”

“I won’t say anything, then. But I think he’d want to know.”

Zack smiled and said, “I owe you one.”

Tifa paused, then, because she had to be sure, reached out to tap his shoulder. He let her, and her hand passed right through. It felt cold and damp, like sticking her hand in fog. 

She shrugged and said, “Can’t blame me for trying.” Then she turned and went back to bed, leaving Zack to his own devices. 

Cloud, for his part, was glad he didn’t feel like he was losing it anymore. He didn’t mind the idea of a ghost around; his childhood home had been haunted. It was a little odd, seeing silhouettes and hearing noises with no explanation behind them. Things moving on their own. Hot and cold spots. The feeling of eyes on him. But, strangely enough, it was almost comforting, this time. He’d been terrified as a child, until he’d gotten used to it. Maybe it was because of that, but this haunting didn’t bother him at all. He felt safer, almost, and that was odd, because there was very little that could threaten him. But he felt like he could take on Sephiroth again, with this ghost by his side. 

It was  _ weird _ . 

His only complaint was that the photo from Nibelheim kept turning up on his nightstand. Normally, Cloud had it face down in a drawer where he could take it out when he needed to see it, but didn’t have to confront it unless he wanted to. It always broke his heart a little to see it, but sometimes, when he already felt heartbroken, it helped. 

So seeing the photo every morning, now, was a rude reminder that he didn’t want to confront. He came to the only conclusion he could. 

He would leave a note. 

On the back of a torn piece of paper, some sort of invoice, he wrote, “Please stop putting the photo up.”

He went to sleep that night, and when he woke up, the photo was back on the nightstand, like every morning. 

The next night, he left the note out again, but underlined “please” three times. 

The next morning, the photo was out again. This time, when he checked the note, there was a response. 

“I’ll think about it.”

And Cloud’s heart almost stopped beating in his chest. 

Because he  _ knew  _ that handwriting. It was only a few odd angles and curls away from his own. And the problem with that was that his handwriting was one of the few hold-overs from when he had all but been Zack. It was muscle memory, and he couldn’t shake it, no matter how hard he tried. Eventually, he gave up, deciding to accept this as a part of Zack that would always be with him, and no one else ever knew, so it couldn’t bother them. 

A ghost answering him in Zack’s handwriting. How safe he felt. The photo. Hell, the expert way his sword was handled when he found it in the morning, not where he left it. 

He looked around and whispered, “Zack?” in a voice that cracked. 

There was no answer. 

He swallowed thickly before snatching his goggles from the dresser and slapping First Tsurugi to his back. He blew past both Tifa and the kids without a word, going like he had wolves at his heels. He flung himself onto Fenrir and was gone in a blink. 

When he returned that night, dusty from racing all day in the Wastes around Edge, he felt only a little better. 

At least, until Tifa blocked his path on the stairs. 

She spun her finger in a circle, and Cloud sighed before complying, turning around and going back down the stairs. She poured him a drink—it would do nothing, the way it always did, but the burn and the gesture helped in their own way. 

“What’s wrong with you?”

“I—I know who the ghost is.”

And Tifa paused a long moment before sighing. She then poured herself a drink, and got through a gulp before Cloud narrowed his eyes at her. When she wouldn’t meet his gaze, he swore. 

“You know, don’t you?”

She took another drink, then sighed and set the glass on the bar. 

“He said not to tell you.”

“He  _ said _ ? He—he  _ talked _ to you?”

She grimaced but nodded. 

“A while ago. Listen, he was really emphatic that I shouldn’t say anything.”

“ _ Why?” _

“Because you can’t see him, Cloud.”

“Why the hell not?”

“No, I mean  _ literally _ . You won’t be able to.”

Cloud looked absolutely stricken. He paled, and he had to set his drink on the bar. 

“Gaia has rules, about this kind of thing,” she explained. “The closest living person to you can’t see you. There’s not anything to be done about it. I’m surprised he let you know who he was at all; he knew this would hurt you.”

Cloud huffed a bitter laugh. He ruffled his hair, and then jerked his hand away; he could slip into pretending at being Zack right now. Not even for the comfort of it. 

He took the note out of his pocket and slapped it on the table. Tifa took it and read it before looking up at him, confused. 

“Zack’s handwriting was the one thing I couldn’t shake.”

Understanding dawned on her face. She set the note down gingerly. 

“But this means you can talk, right? Leave notes for each other? It’s better than nothing, Cloud.”

Which, while incredibly valid, was not what he wanted to hear. 

He stood up and stormed off, as Tifa called, “At least think about it!”

And the problem was, he couldn’t stop. The idea wouldn’t get out of his head. It would be little better than being pen-pals. Not even as good as the texting they used to do. But it was  _ something _ . 

So that night, Cloud stole a fresh piece of paper from their printer, and wrote on it, “I love you so much, but you’re an asshole for not telling me.” He left the pen beside it the way he did before. 

When he woke up, it said, “I’m sorry—I thought it would help. I love you too, Spike. To the moon and back.” Next to it was a little drawing of a crescent moon with some clouds around it. 

Cloud felt the small smile curl over his face, and his eyes start to water. It was only when tears began to drip onto the page that he sniffled and wiped his eyes. 

Yeah. It was going to be a lot better than nothing. 


End file.
